#i love my latino sweets but I'm kinda jealous lmao

[red-hibiscus]

So I went to a Thai sweets cafe and here are my thoughts

Context: My area has no Thai restaurants and I've only has Thai food twice in my life. So I really know nothing. I asked the staff to give me recs and info. Also our lovely Perth Nakhun has a video on Thai sweets on his YouTube. UMWA edition (bc of course) which covers leum kluen and khanom tom/kho which I ate.

Golden Thread Pandan Cake

Recommended by staff. Golden thread is made out of egg and I was a bit skeptical bc I don't always like egg. But I actually really liked it. The cake tastes like a kind of sponge cake or a pound cake? It doesn't really have a strong taste. Like eating it by itself is kind of plain (not in a bad way), but mixed with the golden thread that has a slightly stronger taste was very nice. Good combo.

Khanom tom

At least I think it's khanom tom. Pretty sure. Could be khanom kho. They're very similar. Staff described them as kinda dumpling balls?

Google says there's a version that's rolled in coconut flakes. Personally I quite liked the warm coconut cream. It was very nice. I was surprised by how warm it was. I think I expected it to be room temp or cooler, but it was very warm like a warm glass of milk.

While I like coconut, I sometimes get tired of the taste depending on how it's done. But I was surprised by how much I liked the cream with the dumplings that had coconut inside. It's a glutinous rice ball (essentially mochi, same concept). So very chewy. Then there's the coconut filling which is nice. The coconut milk adds a bit of extra depth to it I think.

Khanom Chan

(Steamed layered coconut cake)

Chewy coconut jelly. Really liked this one. Possibly my favorite idk. I like jelly and they're very pretty. I'm biased. Not as chewy as the khanom chan, but you know... usual jelly texture. The jelly is pretty thick. Thicker than the little jello containers i usually eat. Which I liked. Portion size is very good bc it does seem like Thai sweets can be on the filling side of things. As opposed to idk... a chocolate bar.

The jelly isn't sweet. On the savory side. I was also told this was best eaten warm, though it could be eaten at room temperature.

Leum Kluen

Forget to swallow

Left is what they're supposed to look like, right is a picture I took on the train home after I ate one. The coconut on top spilled a bit, but it's fine

This was definitely the lightest of the sweets I got. A quick 1-2 bites and it's gone. I think I had 3 or 4. It's a cute little dessert. It's also a bit chewy, but far less so than the others. There's a softer texture. I think it's a bit sweeter? But not by much. I quite liked this one too. Because it's not as heavy it's easier to eat more of them and I can see this being served in larger amounts are parties.

This is also the only dessert I remembered from UMWA that I watched years ago lmao and I get why they wanted it.

Other thoughts and info

I told the staff that I didn't really know anything about Thai food/desserts and that's why I was there. I saw ads for it on IG and decided to stop by (also it was burning outside & I wanted Thai milk tea to revive myself). They just opened & the cafe is only 6 months old, so the person was able to give me recommendations and explanations to the general idea of thai desserts.

Coconut and pandan are very important and that definitely came across. If you want Thai food you must accept the coconut. Luckily I like coconut when served with in/with other foods (though rarely raw by itself). Pandan I've never tried before, but it's not bad.

Thai desserts tend to be very delicate. Gotta make it look good for events and elders they joked. It's also not very sweet. Which is true. I wouldn't call anything I ate sweet, which is probably why I liked them so much. I'm not really a fan of sweet things. But the Thai sweets I had were at a good level where they definitely tasted like a dessert, but didn't overwhelm me with sweetness.

My main knowledge of Thai culture is from media (some rock bands, bl), some acquaintances, and the one time I took a linguistics field research course that happened to be on Thai (was actually one of my fav classes). So I know a bit but it was nice to see more into the cuisine. Especially since I live far from a wider variety of foods in general.

They were a bit different to the sweets I usually eat (if any). So I thought I'd share my thoughts